Etymologically
Log in

domestic

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 15 October 2026 at 20:30. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

  • IPA: /dəˈmes.tɪk/[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Middle French domestique and directly from Latin domesticus (“belonging to the household”),[2][3][4] from domus (“house”),[2][3] from Proto-Indo-European *dem- (“house, household”).[2] The Latin adjective was presumably formed from a lost *domestis, under the influence of words such as rusticus.[3][5] It is related to dome, domicile, domesticate and timber.[3][6][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Made or prepared in the home: before 1425 in Barnhart,[3] the early 15th century in Etymonline.[2]

Semantic evolution

“Belonging to one's own country, not foreign” is from 1545,[3][7] and “of the home or household” from 1611, in Shakespeare's Cymbeline.[3][7] Of animals, “tame, living under human care”, is from the 1610s,[2][7] and of people, “devoted to home life”, from the 1650s.[2] The noun, a member of the household, is from 1539, and a household servant from 1613, in Shakespeare's Henry VIII;[3] the longer phrase servaunt domestical is attested from the mid-15th century.[2] Domestics, articles of home manufacture, is from the 1620s, in the 19th-century United States especially home-made cotton cloth.[2] Domestic violence meant revolution and insurrection in the 19th century, as in the United States Constitution, and violence in the home from 1977.[2]

Timeline

  • c. 1425 – made in the home.[3]
  • 1539 – noun, a household member.[3]
  • 1545 – of one's own country.[3][7]
  • 1611 – of the household.[3][7]
  • 1613 – a household servant.[3]
  • 1620 – of tame animals.[7]
  • 1977 – domestic violence in the home.[2]

Modern meaning

Adjective

  1. Of or relating to the family or household.
  2. Fond of home life and household affairs.
  3. Of animals, tame or domesticated.
  4. Of a country's internal affairs.
  5. Produced in or native to a particular country.

Noun

  1. A household servant.
  2. An article of home manufacture, such as cotton cloth or household linen.

Word family

  • domestically
  • antidomestic
  • domesticize
  • nondomestic
  • predomestic
  • semidomestic
  • undomestic
  • domestic violence
  • domesticate
  • domesticity
  • dome
  • domicile
  • dominate
  • timber

References

  1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  4. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b c d e f Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press